The spectral electricity came again, but this time there was hardly enough to tingle Jerusa’s skin. Was it possible that Alicia had exhausted her power on the savage? Jerusa pressed forward and though Alicia slowed her down, she couldn’t stop her from getting to Thad.
Thad sat with his back against the wall, watching this all play out with a look of detached disbelief etched on his face.
Taos’s voice echoed through the tunnels. He called out Jerusa’s name. He was drawing closer, probably following her scent, or maybe Thad’s, but he wouldn’t get here in time to stop her.
Hot tears streaked her cheeks and for once she was thankful for the darkness. That way Thad couldn’t see the blood leaking from her eyes only to reabsorb into her face. That way his last few moments of life might not be filled with absolute dread.
She was going to kill him. There was no stopping it now. The thirst had grown too strong. She could think of nothing else but quenching the fiery nest of serpents slithering within her bones. Alicia stayed between Jerusa and Thad, but with every step the ghost lost ground to the vampire.
“I’m sorry,” Jerusa said to Thad. “I’m so sorry.”
Maybe he thought she was apologizing for involving him in this undead world, or for almost getting him eaten by a savage. Or maybe he understood just what she was saying. Whatever the case, he didn’t attempt to escape. He just sat there, staring up at her with his deep, soulful eyes.
Alicia wrapped her arm around the back of Jerusa’s head and pulled her face down. Jerusa allowed her cheek to rest on the ghost’s clavicle, but continued to drive toward Thad. Alicia had no corporeal body, no flesh or bone or blood, yet she felt wholly there nonetheless. Her skin was hot to the touch. Her bones sat sturdy beneath her soft flesh. Strands of her hair even tickled Jerusa’s nose. Why could she feel Alicia and not any of the other countless ghosts she had encountered?
A strong pang of blood thirst rippled through Jerusa and she would have doubled over had she not been leaning on Alicia. Her borrowed heart raged within her chest and that’s when something rather odd happened.
Alicia’s aura began to flicker in time with Jerusa’s heartbeat. She turned her head, further exposing her neck and Jerusa brought her mouth up without thought. A pulse thrummed within Alicia’s neck, as though she had blood and a heart to pump it with.
But that was foolishness. Alicia’s body had been placed below ground almost three years ago. The only part of her still alive was beating within Jerusa’s own chest. Yet still, Jerusa’s vampiric instincts couldn’t seem to discern the truth. She closed her eyes and gave into the predatory nature that now defined her.
Jerusa clutched Alicia tight, so tight that had she been a living person she might have broken her in half. She clamped her mouth onto the ghost’s neck and forced her fangs through the skin that wasn’t really there.
Jerusa gasped with ecstasy. It was as though someone had filled her with liquid light. The world spun out of existence, leaving her drifting on the ether. The thundering pulse of her heart echoed all around her and her mind filled with images, memories of Alicia’s life. Alicia’s mother and father tucking her in as a child. Learning to ride a bike. Even the night of her prom…the night she never came home.
Jerusa wasn’t sure how long this went on. It felt as though she had outraced the earth to the end of time. When she came to, she found herself still clutching Alicia. Her arms fell away, heavy as lead. Alicia stumbled backwards and fell to the floor, her aura now just a thin dwindling light. Jerusa swooned, almost joining Alicia on the floor, but a pair of powerful hands caught her.
“Are you all right?” Taos asked.
She stepped back out of his grasp and nodded. And the truth was she did feel all right. Not just all right, but invigorated in a way she hadn’t been since first becoming a vampire. Her thirst was gone. She went to Thad and offered him a hand up, without even the slightest fear that she might attack him.
He took her hand without question and rose to his feet. “What was that? What happened to you?”
“I’m not exactly sure, but I think I just fed from Alicia.” She turned to the ghost who looked up at her with a thin smile. “Are you okay?” Alicia nodded, but quickly vanished. The other ghosts stood motionless, watching her with great glassy eyes. Foster stood between the vampire ghost with the piebald eyes and the Monster’s fledgling. “Did I hurt her?” she asked Foster.
He looked as confused as the rest of them.
“How can you feed from a ghost?” Thad asked. “Ghosts don’t have blood.”
“You’re right, they don’t,” Jerusa said. “But she gave me something. I’m not sure what exactly, but I’ll take it.”
Taos sparked a small fire in the palm of his hand and drew near to her. He took her face in his other hand and turned her head side to side. He stopped and stared into her eyes for a long moment and she couldn’t help but wonder if he had any recollection of their kiss. If he did, she hoped he wouldn’t bring it up in front of Thad. She felt too good to think about dealing with that drama right now.
“Whatever Alicia did to you,” Taos said, “I don’t think it’s going to do you much good.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
Thad came closer and looked intently at her. His brow furrowed and the corners of his mouth turned down.
“What is it?”
“Your eyes are filled with blood,” Taos said. “And so are your lips. Alicia may have quenched your thirst, but you are still starving.”
“I’ll be fine,” Jerusa said. “I’ll just drip a little blood in my eyes and on my lips. The Stewards won’t suspect a thing.”
“No,” Taos said in a voice stern as a thunderclap. “You don’t understand. The thirst is the least of your problems. Without fresh blood you will cease to heal properly. Your strength and speed will wane. And given enough time—”
“I know. I know,” Jerusa cut him off. “If I don’t start drinking blood then the Stone Cloak will come upon me. You don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be fine.”
“You tried to feed on Thad, didn’t you?” Taos asked. His pale eyes glimmered in the flickering light of the tiny flame, making it look as though a turbulent sea rested within each orb.
“Yes, but Alicia stopped me.”
“But you almost overpowered her? You were able to fight through the pain?”
“Yes.” She didn’t like the way his eyes darted between her and Thad. “I think she wore herself out with the savage.”
“Is she still weak? Do you think you could fight her off again?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
Taos quenched the fire in his palm and snatched Thad by the back of his neck with blinding speed. Thad barely had a moment to shout out in alarm before he was hoisted from the ground and flipped up on his back.
Taos held Thad out to her, forcing his neck towards her face. “Take him. You have to.”
“No,” Jerusa shouted. “Put him down!”
“You need blood.” Taos took a step towards her just as she took a step back. Thad fought all the harder, lashing out at Taos’s face with his fists, kicking at his chest, all without effect. “The sunlight burned you. Not bad, but you won’t heal fast enough. The Stewards might not notice your eyes or lips, but the Hunters are going to be watching you. They will notice when the burns don’t vanish fast enough.”
“I’ll be fine. Now put him down. Right now! I mean it!”
Her words slid right off of him. “He’s dead already. You have to know that. The Stewards have passed their judgment. He won’t be turned. Why else did they put him down here if not to die?” A desperate madness rose within him.
“It was a test. Just a test. To see if I could really talk to the spirits. But I won. I beat them. We saved Thad. He’s not going to die.”
Taos wrenched Thad’s head back and the boy uttered a groan of pain. “If you won’t feed from him then I will. I will finish what I started. But it should be you. You should f
eed while Alicia is too weak to stop you.”
A long moment passed where Jerusa and Taos stood stark still, eyes locked, each awaiting the other to make the first move. Even Thad ceased his struggling, either accepting his fate or wrung out from too much adrenaline.
“I won’t,” Jerusa said finally. “And neither will you.”
That was the wrong thing to say to Taos. He bore his fangs with a defiant sneer, then bit into Thad’s neck.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Jerusa screamed, though whether from fear or fury even she couldn’t say. The army of spirits surrounding her lit up like a flash of lightning, resplendent and dazzling for one brief moment, blinding her to all else.
She was on Taos before she even realized that she meant to attack him. Jerusa punched him in the face, driving his head back and away from Thad’s neck. The scent of his blood washed over her, but instead of invoking her thirst, it only fueled her rage.
She sent punch after punch rocketing into Taos’s face. He dropped Thad to the ground, tripped on his own feet and tumbled backward. Jerusa was on top of him in an instant, hammering at his chest and face. His nose gave a terrible crunching noise and blood spilled from his mouth. He threw up his hands, but made no attempt to fight back, or to even stop her.
Jerusa’s hands became as heavy as a pair of anvils, but she swung them again and again, until her muscles cramped and burned and there was nothing else she could give. She dropped her arms to her sides. She sat astride Taos, heaving and gasping, sure at any moment her lungs would try to escape out of her mouth. Taos’s face was bruised and mashed, with one eye swollen up like a tomato. He regarded her from his good eye and a steady stream of tears dripped from the bloody corner. She had never seen Taos cry, hadn’t ever thought he was capable of it and it sucked all of the rage out of her.
Jerusa stood up slowly, motioning for Taos to stay where he was. She turned toward Thad, but she didn’t dare tempt her thirst by going near to him.
“Are you all right,” she called to him.
Thad sat with his back against the wall, holding his neck. “Yeah, I think so.” He turned a set of hate-filled eyes on Taos. “You bit me…again.”
Taos stood to his feet. All emotion, good or bad, was gone from his face. The tears had vanished leaving Jerusa to wonder if they had actually been there at all. His wounds were already healing and soon would be gone. It made her keenly aware of the stinging sunburn covering her face and hands.
“It won’t happen again,” Taos said. With that he turned and shambled off to the far corner of the room.
They sat in silence the rest of the day. Jerusa laid on her back in the filth and grime, thinking that she would trade all her vampiric powers and immortality for a hot shower and a full day’s treatment at a spa. It was a strange sensation and hard to articulate, but a colossal sense of pride swelled within her. She had been through hell. She had faced the Stewards’ test and won.
A bit of her old self rose up like a chilly wind, telling her she had no right to feel this way when her mother lay dying somewhere within the great house. It was her mother’s voice telling her this. The voice of guilt was always her mother’s. It just didn’t sound as loud now.
Jerusa drifted in and out of sleep, sometimes awakened by one of her ghostly entourage hoping to get her attention. After a while, they let her sleep, though that may have been Foster’s doing. Alicia didn’t appear all the rest of the day, but Jerusa knew she hadn’t gone far.
The sun settled beneath the horizon. Jerusa felt its decent and sat up. She opened her thumb with her fang and dripped a few drops of blood in each eye, started to smear it on her lips, but decided to coat her face and arms with it. Despite Taos’s prediction, the burns had mostly healed and the ones that hadn’t, vanished as her skin reabsorbed the blood.
Another hour passed in silence. The ghosts shuffled around her in agitation and Alicia appeared in front of her, looking young and beautiful as always, save for a weariness in her eyes. Jerusa didn’t have to ask. She knew what had stirred the ghosts.
“They’re coming for us.”
Thad was dozing near the ladder and jumped with a start at Jerusa’s voice. He stood up and backed towards her. Taos joined them, standing on her other side. She could feel the competitive heat passing between the two men. She could only imagine the intensity if Silvanus had been there with them.
A wave of sadness passed over her, but she didn’t have time to think about him right now.
The hatch door flung open with a loud bang. Icy wind and snow rushed in. Moonlight puddled on the floor, giving the room a dreamlike luminescence. Without noise, five beings dropped into the tunnel below.
“All alive I see,” Ming said, with an air of disgust.
“I would have thought at least one of you would have died,” Ralgar added. “Even the human survived. How disappointing.”
“You did well, blood-witch,” Ming said, though the words must have tasted terrible to her. “Four is no easy number, though the savages were still mindless. Tell me, how long ago did you dispatch the last savage?”
“Several hours ago. It was still full daylight.”
Celeste couldn’t contain her smile, but the other four Hunters shot nervous glances at one another.
“You don’t believe me?” Jerusa asked.
“It doesn’t matter what we believe,” Ming said. “Come with us. The Stewards are waiting.”
They climbed up the ladder and out the hatch. The wind whipped at them so hard that a few times Jerusa thought her bare skin might split open. No matter the cold, she would still survive. It was Thad that she worried about. Thankfully, they didn’t have far to go. The pair of SUVs was waiting on a thin road, distinguishable only by the break in the trees and a pair of tire tracks. The heat inside the cab was such a wonderful relief that Jerusa almost cried out for joy.
They drove back to the great house in silence. Jerusa had hoped to grab a hot shower and a change of clothes when they got back to the Ice Sanctuary, but as soon as they parked beneath the stone archway, Ming and the Crimson Storm led them to a large room off of the great hall.
Marjek and the other High Council sat on cushioned thrones positioned atop another raised platform. They seemed to like looking down on everyone else.
Shufah sat in her own meek wooden chair at the bottom of the stage. Her tiny amused smile exploded when they entered the room. “You see, Marjek. I told you not to underestimate my coven.” She greeted each of them with a hug. She lingered a bit longer with Jerusa, her dark eyes searching for some subtle secret buried within.
Marjek rose from his seat and the other members of the High Council followed his lead. He glared at Jerusa for a long moment before turning his eyes towards the Crimson Storm. “It’s obvious that they all made it out alive, but were they successful in dispatching all of the savages?” His handsome features were pulled tight. It agitated him to have to ask about the savages.
Ming stepped forward, head bowed, eyes averted like a chastised child. “Yes, my lord.”
“How many savages roamed the tunnels?” Heidi asked.
“Four.”
The other four members of the Council seemed impressed by this, but Marjek continued to scowl. Ming glanced upward as though she wanted to say more, thought better of it and returned her eyes to the floor. Heidi told her to speak freely.
“They also managed to kill the four savages within only a few hours of entering the tunnels.”
“Well done.” There was no cheer in his voice. “It is the decision of the council that Jerusa Phoenix be granted the right to immortality by virtue of her unique talent.” The word couldn’t have been any more painful to him had they been made of broken glass.
To Jerusa it was the most wonderful thing she had ever heard. A mountain of stress lifted from her and she looked at her feet to make sure they were still touching the floor.
Marjek continued. “The vampire Jerusa and the vampire Taos have earned their places among the
clan of Hunters.”
Jerusa came crashing back down to earth. She had been so happy to know that she was going to live that she had forgotten what type of life she would have to endure. Join them if you wish to live, Sebastian’s voice called out in her mind. But you must escape at the first opportunity, before they get the chance to destroy you.
“There is no higher calling,” Marjek said. “You are now soldiers of blood. Protectors, not only of the vampire realm, but of all that breathes upon the earth.”
Jerusa had a feeling they were getting the condensed speech, the one without pomp or fanfare. Celeste stepped before them, holding a ring in each hand. To Taos, she offered a large ring with a broad silver band and a flat face with the Hunters’ insignia embossed in bright rubies.
He took the ring, a tight smile upon his face and placed it upon the index finger of his right hand. He looked at it with satisfaction. At one time, it had been his dream to join the Hunters, even though his rugged beauty had purchased his immortality long ago. He had renounced that dream after joining their coven, but did he still feel the same way? That smile left a hollow space in Jerusa’s stomach.
Celeste stepped before Jerusa. She held out a ring similar to Taos’s, though smaller and designed for a woman’s hand. Celeste’s hand trembled a bit. She was nervous, but why?
Jerusa glanced up at the High Council. They stared down on her in contempt, except for Heidi who had a morbid look of fascination etched into her eyes. It was a look that left Jerusa feeling like an ameba wriggling beneath the eye of a microscope.
Shufah watched her with a mixture of pride and sadness. She nodded for Jerusa to take the ring, so she did. She followed Taos’s lead and placed the ring upon her right index finger. She expected there to be some sort of oath they would have to recite (perhaps for more worthy vampires, there was), but instead, the High Council merely turned without word and started to leave.
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